Your Road to the PhD: Who Are You Thankful For?

Whether a Derby-winning horse, a Grammy-nominated musician, or a PhD-obtaining scientist, there exists a cast of unsung heroes who have made the individual’s success possible. We might not have three trainers, a jockey and eat carrots all day long, but we certainly have people who have popped us with the whip every once in a while to keep us going. Fortunately, they’re usually the same people that are there to catch us when we stumble as well. With Thanksgiving just a few days away, let’s take a moment to remember, appreciate, and thank the entourage that made our pursuit of science possible.

Day one of graduate school is incredibly exciting – our whole graduate experience is a blank slate upon which each of us projected our own fantasy career. For many of us, that involves making a huge discovery and graduating within three years. Who needs support in grad school- I mean, how hard can it be?!… Two years later when find ourselves troubleshooting simple bacterial transformations that have suddenly stopped working, it’s painfully clear that graduation is nowhere in sight – and that maybe this is going to be tougher than we thought.

Consider how much fun we were to be around in the fourth year, when we were a raging ball of apathy. Tony Robbins would have been disappointed, but our support group wasn’t. They stood by (or maybe ‘put up with’) us and gave us the strength to keep going. Maybe it was a new idea from our PI, maybe it was a $20 bill in the mail, maybe it was a hug from a friend – they all mattered. Of course, when we needed the help most, we were probably least capable (see ‘raging ball of apathy’ phase) of giving our heartfelt thanks to those who deserved it.

So pause your day for one minute to think about those who made your success possible and, if possible, let them know how much you appreciate it.

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Have any stories of seemingly small actions that meant a lot to you when you were in grad school?

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